Science Weekly: Brain scans and volcanic ash

Alok Jha and guests discuss the new play Interior Traces about the growing power of brain scans to peer into our minds.
Plus: climate change and the general election; and why nobody seems to have quantified the risks to jet engines from ash

With the help of a neuroscientist, writers Louise Whiteley and James Wilkes have written a play about the growing power of brain scans not just to diagnose disease but also to read our minds and predict our behaviour. Who will own our scans and how might they be used to invade the once-private territory of our thoughts?

We hear excerpts and Alok Jha talks to the authors about the issues they explore in the play. Their science consultant, neuroscientist Geraint Rees of University College London, joins us in the studio.